Spanish wind turbine-maker Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy (SGRE) has secured an order from Seamade to supply turbines for 487MW SeaMade offshore wind project, which will be located off the coast of Belgium.
Image: Siemens Gamesa to supply for 487MW Belgian offshore wind. Photo: Courtesy of Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy, S.A.
Siemens Gamesa will supply turbines for the wind project which includes two previous wind farms Mermaid (235MW) and Seastar (252MW) that were combined to form the SeaMade offshore wind project.
Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy offshore business unit CEO Andreas Nauen said: “We are very pleased that our preferred supplier agreement announced in March 2018 has now become a fully confirmed order with SeaMade NV. Combining the two project areas into one project shows excellent leadership by our customer to drive down the cost of energy from offshore wind through economies of scale.
“We look forward to the next steps in the project, helping meet the Belgian government’s 2020 climate objectives.”
SeaMade is a partnership formed by the Otary RS with 70% stake, Engie Electrabel with 17.5% stake and Eneco Wind Belgium with 12.5% stake.
For this project, Siemens Gamesa will supply 58 of its SG 8.0-167 DD 8MW direct drive offshore wind turbines. For the Seastar project, 30 of the turbines will be supplied and the remaining 28 turbines will supplied to the Mermaid project, the company stated.
The 252MW Seastar project will be located 40km off the country’s coast. Here the turbines will be installed on monopile foundations, into water depths of up to 38m. This wind farm is expected to power nearly 260,000 Belgian households with clean electricity.
The 235MW Mermaid project will be located about 54km off the coast and the turbines will be installed on monopile foundations, which could go as deep as 40m. The clean electricity from the project will be sufficient to power nearly 230,000 Belgian households.
Offshore construction is expected to begin next year and is scheduled for the completion in 2020. To ensure the long-term performance of the turbines, SGRE will provide logistics solution as well as remote monitoring and diagnostics for 17 years
Separately, the company has secured multiple contracts to supply wind turbines with a total capacity of 263MW to various onshore wind projects to be built in Sweden, Norway, Germany and Turkey.